Saturday, August 16, 2014

But that’s what replay is for — to sort it all out. After a review lasting 4 minutes and 9 seconds, Davidson relayed the news: Amarista was still out. Black couldn’t believe it.

So this is where replay has led us. Davidson barely makes a call. He seemingly has no idea what happened and is pretty much on his way to the headset as soon as the play is over. Everyone stands around while they watch replays that can’t definitively settle the issue. So they stick with the original call which was made with all the conviction of someone ordering dinner off a menu written in Swahili. We still get the manager argument, so more wasted time.

In the end, the only thing we no for sure is something we already knew: Bob Davidson sucks.

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If you watch where the tag attempt starts and establish a straight line to the plate, then note that when he finishes his initial slide he's roughly perpendicular to that line, then if you agree he's three feet away from the plate at that time then he technically ran out of the baseline. He looked to be at least three home plates from the base when he stands up to dive at it to me. I know baseball rules are esoteric and guarded by the umpires cabal, but strictly interpreted he was out of the baseline.

In the linked article, go to the MLB video, not the first one. Pause it at the 3:05 mark. That's when Pierzynski has the ball. At that moment, the baseline - the line from Amarista to the base - goes through, or close to, the corner of grass where the straight base path from third to home meets up with the circular area around home plate. (That corner is obscured by Grandal's head in that shot, so use his head as a proxy.)

At the 3:08 mark, he is still trying to avoid a tag play, and his feet are a full body length away from that point. Unless Amarista and Pierzynski are both shorter than 3 feet, he is out of the baseline.

At the 3:11 mark, Davidson is pointing to where the tag attempt was made. He is either pointing to say he made the tag, or pointing to say he was out of the baseline, or thought he was looking at a box of donuts and saying, "That one there looks tasty." Granted, he should be ruling that the runner is out; and if he was out of the baseline he should have said so to Black when he went for the replay review, and Black shouldn't have been surprised at the ruling. The reactions and circumstantial evidence don't look good for Davidson, but the out call is correct.

I'm not an expert on the new rules, but if Amarista continues full bore towards the plate as Pierzynski steps into the baseline to field the throw doesn't that make a dangerous collision inevitable? And if Amarista had plowed into the Cardinals' catcher while he was attempting to make the play would he have been called out regardless of whether he was tagged or not? If the situation is such that a collision = the runner is automatically out then the three foot baseline rule can't apply. And if the runner is obligated to stay within the three foot baseline and hit the catcher as hard as he can to break up the play then what's the point of the new collision rules? Or is Amarista just supposed to stop running and allow himself to be tagged out?

Agreed that Davidson appears completely clueless during the entire play, which is half the problem here. It looks like he wants to call a balk on *somebody* but can't quite figure out who.

Or is Amarista just supposed to stop running and allow himself to be tagged out?

If AJ doesn't have the ball, then Amarista can keep going and it's AJ who's breaking the rules. But if AJ has the ball, then the answer to your question is "yes". Just like at any other base. I mean, technically he has other options. He can slide and try to avoid a tag. Or he can stop and run back to third.

I think this year that runners are unsure of the rules and erring too much on the side of caution. If the catcher is blocking the plate and he has the ball...the runner doesn't have to go around him. He's just not allowed to try and knock the catchers fillings out. If you see an opening...slide. If you break the catchers ankle...well...

They could have made things so much easier with this line of thinking. If you do something near home plate that would get you called for interference or obstruction if you were near second or third, then you get called for interference or obstruction.

Number 4 hasn't been seeing many Cards games. They must have the worst record at challenges. The only reason they didn't lose this one was that the replay officials couldn't find one to overturn the original call, so you had to assume Davidson was right. He was out twice for going out of the basepath and he got tagged. What more do you want.

I see...The Cardinals have been "wrong" on challenges 15 times...in comparison the Cubs have been wrong on challenges 25 times....I'm thinking the Cubs with the most challenges in baseball(by a good margin--5 over the second place Rays) and most times being wrong on those challenges, would pretty much take the lead for whiniest team in baseball. :)

On a percentage, though, the Cardinals are the whiniest, if you define whiny as an unwarranted (i.e., you're not in the right) public expression of your perception of having been wronged (i.e., challenging).

CFB- does your table identify how many challenges STL has initiated and won, or how many it's been involved in (total)?

Harvey's whiney post was about the Cardinals winning challenges that other teams initiated, so that data may not completely refute his aspersions. It does show that MIL and PIT have won an awful lot more challenges that they initiated than STL has, though.

Has anyone come up with an approximate run value of an overturned call? It would have to be close to a full run, right?

CFB- does your table identify how many challenges STL has initiated and won, or how many it's been involved in (total)?

I'm assuming it's challenge initiated.. It is from bb-reference.

Harvey's whiney post was about the Cardinals winning challenges that other teams initiated, so that data may not completely refute his aspersions.

True but it's at least one point of evidence that his post was pulled out of his ass. There just aren't that many challenges period, that there is anything that resembles a trend. There are on average 2 challenges per team, per week. There isn't enough possibilities for a trend to exist, unless you are looking to see that trend happen.

Both on the MLB app and on the website whenever there's a challenge the game score gets like grayed out and is placed in a different area. It's really weird. Why are they trying to highlight these challenges? Do they think it makes the whole thing seem cooler? But it's drawing attention to the length of the challenges in a strange and totally unnecessary way.

CFB- does your table identify how many challenges STL has initiated and won, or how many it's been involved in (total)?

The website Baseball Savant has a nifty tool for baseball challenges, the Cardinals have been "challenged" 24 times and have been overturned(against the Cardinals other words) 45.83%, right along with the league average(47.07%).

I see...The Cardinals have been "wrong" on challenges 15 times...in comparison the Cubs have been wrong on challenges 25 times....I'm thinking the Cubs with the most challenges in baseball(by a good margin--5 over the second place Rays) and most times being wrong on those challenges, would pretty much take the lead for whiniest team in baseball. :)

This is an unfair comparison. The Cards know how to play baseball and are actually trying to win games but are whiny little #######. The Cubs are incompetent and challenge calls only to try to maintain the facade that they want to win the game. I'm sure Renteria is under orders to only challenge every other incorrect calls and lots of correct ones. If we fall a draft slot due to a successful challenge, heads are gonna roll!